Its my idea to eat outdoors for 120 days of the year at the very least. I like summer food- grilled burgers, fresh corn and tomatoes, big salads with chicken. I am at my most vulnerable for good potato chips, and ice cream, as well. I am impatient for this first day of the outdoor dining season, and so sorry to see it end. In Michigan we have a lengthy dose of “lets go inside” weather. For this reason I will still be having dinner outdoors in October, with my blanket around me. Just get me outside, under any and every circumstance. Dinner in the garden is my idea of fine entertainment. This 22 foot long pine and steel table can handle lots of dinner guests with ease. Pine is a very traditional material for American garden furniture; it just requires upkeep. Its traditional material aside, it has a decidedly sleek and modern silhouette. It interests me how overscaled furniture has such strong visual interest. This long table suggests a lot of people, close together, having fun.

This old French faux bois table for two makes a different suggestion. The old concrete is beautiful on this vintage slate terrace. It is the organizing element for a private and intimate garden space. Ornament in a garden can create a mood, and set the stage-for what, we can only imagine.

I so love white dining furniture. It has a clean and crisp look. What china, flowers and food would not look great on this table? Wood dining furniture finished in high gloss weather resistant paint dresses up dinner in the garden. This dining table is placed in a garden room defined by a white wood pergola.

This English made wirework dining furniture is so beautiful for how it graces the landscape in a soft and quiet way. Even with no guests at the dinner hour, it enriches the landscape. Sometimes the suggestion that dinner might be had in the garden is as important as actually having it. Ideally, every design issue is answered in such a way that piques the imagination. What can be imagined changes, and evolves-thus providing no end of interest. Landscape spaces that invite interaction are successful spaces.

I have many clients for whom contemporary design is a big love. This very contemporary dining suite is perfectly placed on a bluestone terrace dating back some 90 years. Who would think this stately old terrace would be so right for this steel and glass furniture? My client, whose imagination and sense of beauty is all her own. Everything about her, as well as her garden, can surprise me, and make me think differently.

I design outdoor dining areas for clients regularly. Sometimes I design tables; this table is 10 feet long, with a white oak base, and top of Valders stone from Wisconsin, with white oak spacers. It will handle company, just fine. It will weather, over the years, just fine. Many an event will be experienced, remembered, and cherished, over this table. Some say that everything that really matters happens at the dinner table. If this is true, what possibilities suggest themselves, given dinner in the garden?

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About the Author

Deborah Silver is a landscape and garden designer whose firm, Deborah Silver and Co Inc, opened its doors in 1986. She opened Detroit Garden Works, a retail store devoted to fine and unusual garden ornament and specialty plants, in 1996. In 2004, she opened the Branch studio, a subsidiary of the landscape company which designs and manufactures garden ornament in a variety of media. Though her formal education is in English literature and biology, she worked as a fine artist in watercolor and pastel from 1972-1983. A job in a nursery, to help support herself as an artist in the early 80’s evolved into a career in landscape and garden design. Her landscape design and installation projects combine a thorough knowledge of horticulture with an artist’s eye for design. Her three companies provide a wide range of products and services to the serious gardener. She has been writing this journal style blog since April of 2009.